A father and a husband

When I think about the nativity of Jesus, the person that always attracts my curiosity and makes me ponder is Joseph the stepfather of Jesus. I underline stepfather because according to the story Mary became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit (Matt. 1:18), not through a man. The Bible also says that Joseph did not have sexual relations with Mary until the child was born (Matt 1:25).

Imagine being Joseph! To hear from the girl you are engaged to be married to say that she is pregnant and you know for sure it isn’t yours. Joseph had not been told at the same time as Mary about what was to take place. God waited a little longer to tell Joseph then He did Mary. Why would God do that? Why did God wait a little while longer to tell Joseph such an important thing?

I can never say that I totally understand why God waited but one thing that I do learn from this is the type of person Joseph was. When I read the nativity accounts in Matthew and Luke’s Gospel I begin to learn something about Joseph as a father and husband that I would never have known if He had known everything that Mary knew when she knew it.

There are two things I see in the life of Joseph that I think are very important for any man that is soon to be or already is a husband and father. The first thing is that he was a man of grace. According to the Laws of the Bible he could have made a public spectacle of Mary, but he chose not to. Joseph loves Mary, he finds out she is pregnant and it is not his baby and even before the Angel appears to him to explain everything we read, “Joseph her fiancé, was a good man and did not want to disgrace her publicly, so he decided to break the engagement quietly” (Matt 1:19). Joseph understood the God of love and grace. He could have been very angry and exposed Mary as an adulterous etc… but he chooses to show grace and love even before he understood everything clearly. According to the law he did not have to expose her and he chooses not to.

The second thing I notice about Joseph in the story is that he is a man of “immediate obedience” to the Word of God. We read in Matthew chapter 1 verse 20 and 21 that the angel of the Lord finally comes to Joseph and tells him what is going on. When this happens Joseph acts immediately on what he hears. He is told what happened to Mary and that he is to take Mary as his wife. In verse 24 we read that when Joseph woke up he did exactly what the angel asked him to do. He married Mary and didn’t even have a sexual relationship with her until after Jesus was born. There were three other times when Joseph was immediately obedient to God’s command and it sure helped in the raising of Jesus (Matt 2:13; 2:21 and 2:22). Each of these times had to do with situations that could have led to the death of Joseph and his family if he had not acted quickly.

Joseph was a man of grace and immediate obedience to the Word of God. God knew this about Joseph and that is why He chooses to let Joseph be the stepfather of His Child. At Christmas I am reminded that God has allowed me to be a husband to one wife and a father to three children that belong to Him. Josephs life and response to God, teaches me what type of husband and father I need to be.